DICKCISSEL 191 



Egg dates. — Illinois: 100 records, May 17 to August 5; 50 records, 

 June 3 to June 20. 



Oklahoma: 15 records, May 14 to June 20; 10 records, June 1 to 

 June 8. 



Texas: 19 records, April 28 to July 7; 10 records. May 12 to June 15. 



FRINGILLA MONTIFRINGILLA Linnaeus 



Brambling 



PLATE 12 



Contributed by Wiluam Maitland Congreve 

 and 

 Hugh Moray Sutherland Blair 



Habits 



The claim of the brambling to a place on the A.O.U. Check-List 

 is based on the occurrence of a vagrant male captured in the watch 

 house at Northeast Point, St. Paul Island, Bering Sea, Oct. 25, 

 1914. The specimen is defective in that it lacks the tail feathers. 



This finch is one of the most characteristic and generally distributed 

 bu'ds of the great forests of northern Eurasia. Indeed its summer 

 range can be said to extend from ocean to ocean, some breeding sta- 

 tions overlooking the Atlantic, while others lie as near to the Sea 

 of Okhotsk. There are reports of nests being found in Britain, but 

 all save one of these must be considered doubtful. The brambling 

 breeds regularly, however, no farther away than western Norway — in 

 some places, close to the coastline. Farther inland, on the forested 

 slopes of the great highlands of Norway and Sweden, this becomes one 

 of the commonest birds. Within the Arctic Circle it breeds freely 

 down to sea level, the drawling song of the male being one of the bird 

 notes most reminiscent of the woods that give so much beauty to the 

 Uttle ports such as Tromso. Bramblings are equally plentiful in 

 northern Finland, where they are to be seen down to at least the 62d 

 parallel. It was from Finland that the first bramblings' eggs known 

 to science were sent to England, a century ago, by that great pioneer 

 of oology, John WoUey, then on his first visit to the North. WoUey 

 reached his future headquarters on the Muonio too late to obtain a 

 nest himself that season, most bramblings having hatched out their 

 young by the time of his arrival; and for these historic specimens 

 he was indebted to the local priest. 



Everywhere within its breeding range, the brambhng — like other 

 northern finches, such as the mealy redpoU (Carduelis Jlammea) and 

 the piae grosbeak {Pinicola enucleator) — is more numerous in some 

 years than in others. Most naturalists who have lived for some time 



